Senate Rejects Obama’s Tax Plan
Chris Hayes had the best moment on television a few days ago, when he was arguing with some Republican Congressman. According to the last thirty years of mainstream political theory: Taxes must be lowered in bad times because the economy is too fragile; Taxes must be lowered in good times because the growth must be preserved. Ergo, by that logic it is never a good time to raise government revenue, and the idea state is one with no taxes at all. Because that would totally work.
That article is a little misleading, in the opening paragraph-
WASHINGTON — The Senate on Saturday rejected President Obama’s proposal to end the Bush-era tax breaks on income above $250,000 for couples and $200,000 for individuals, a triumph for Republicans who have long called for continuing the income tax cuts for everyone.
It's hardly a "triumph" for anyone whose goal is lowered taxes for one group or another, because once the bracket expires, taxes go up for everyone. That's why there's so many different groups wanting them extended. The great joke being, the "Bush tax cuts" being argued over were designed to expire and sunset after ten years, precisely because of the giant hole they would blow in the deficit if they were a permanent effect, and were only instituted to save the economy from the
last recession after the dot-com-bubble.
The "joke" part, is that ten years later, it's the exact same Congressmen and Senators making the exact same arguments about what taxes do to the economy. It never stops being funny.